Escape
by Misskiramel
Summary: Alan is trapped on the grid. Rather than sit idly, he wants to find his missing friend. His only hope of locating Flynn is one of the last programs to have seen him since he vanished, both from within The Grid and the User world, a program that Alan wrote decades ago. Can Alan find Tron before Clu's forces? AU, Uprising universe. Post-scars episode.
1. Zed and Mara

**I don't own Tron or Disney and all that :/**

**I wrote this thing. There's just about 6000 words total, I'm going to post it in three chapters. Here's the first one. There may be spelling/grammar errors because there are too many words and you can only read something over so many times before you lose your mind. Tell me what you think?**

**Rated T for language, violence, and blood.  
**

It poured, as it often did on The Grid. Randomized data, like what made up the sea, showered down in liquid form. The rain created halos around every building, every creature, every vehicle parked along the side of the quiet street. The air was thick with panting, and heavy frantic footsteps pounding out a steady beat against the ground. All noise making programs, the ones with breath enough to speak, had hurried indoors.

A man ran, his white cloak flying behind him as the black guards closed in, their circuits glowing like hellfire. They chased him up out of the woodwork, like bloodhounds sniffing out prey for their hunting master. He didn't know for how long he had been running, for longer than he had ever run in his life he was sure. He'd had never been particularly athletic.

He needed somewhere to hide, to rest for just a moment, but where?

Every window and door along the street had been locked, every program who might help him had shut themselves away.

Then he saw it, the door to a shop, it was open a crack. From the inside warm, golden light spilled out into the darkness. The sight was as welcoming to him as the smell of Lora's fresh baked pie wafting from the open kitchen door to their home, when he arrived from a stressful day.

During the summer, when she returned from her work in DC, she would try to do nice things like that for him while they still had time together. For that, Alan had been able to ignore the stench of something burning, and the murder of his good kitchenware. She was a genius scientist, but she hadn't always been the most brilliant cook.

They would have to lose sight of him first, just for a moment, so he could slip through the doorway. Alan abruptly turned to beeline town the ally just before the shop.

He circled around the back of the building, and in the split second when he was lost from view around the last corner, Alan disappeared. The guard turned the corner, and there was no one. They rushed out into the empty street, their mouse was nowhere in sight.

"Pavel sir, what do we do now?" One of the guards asked the group's leader.

"You four go up the street, the rest of us will go down it. There's only two directions for him to go, we'll find the User." Pavel ground out.

* * *

Zed was cleaning up the shop, doing his best to act like something was still normal, something was still ok. It was a shop that sold vehicle parts. He was polishing the counter top, and he lifted the Lightcycle break mechanism he'd left on the surface to clean the space beneath. He offered a weak attempt at a smile to his reflection in the gleaming material, his dark hair, his darker eyes.

Zed heard the door open, and the sound of soaked fabric as a program moved inside.

"Hey, we're closed-" He began, but stopped as he lifted his head.

A program leaned against the far wall for his support, his legs shook, just about to give out. Zed couldn't see his face, it was shadowed by his hood. His circuits flickered dangerously, black to white, black to white.

He opened his mouth to speak, but he didn't the breath the action would require, instead he gasped for air. Zed wasn't sure if the intruder was about to overheat or shut down from lack of energy.

Zed could here harsh voices through the walls, just outside. They were muffled, but he could make out enough words to determine they were hunting someone. If he were human, his heart would have been in his throat.

"You need energy." He exclaimed, feeling stupid the moment the words left his mouth, for pointing out the obvious. Zed crossed the room toward the stranger.

"Users, how can you even move?" He muttered. As he spoke the program's legs failed him. Zed caught him by the shoulders before he could crumble to the floor.

"I've got you buddy. Come with me, I'll get you something to drink."

He steered Alan in the direction of a side room. In the middle of a floor that closely resembled Tatami, was a low table barely a foot off the ground. He sat Alan down on one of the cushions strewn about the table.

Zed disappeared for a moment, and returned with two glasses of energy. Zed stopped in the doorway. Alan's clothing had miraculously dried, and Zed wondered at that for a moment, was he seeing things? He shook his head.

The pair of them sat across from one another for several micros. Zed watched Alan nervously as the stranger sipped his energy, not speaking. He couldn't even see the expression on his face, if it was content, suspicious, or hostile.

Zed was beginning to wonder if it had been such a good idea to invite a strange program into his home. He had no idea what his function was, maybe he had combat training. He was being chased, he could be a dangerous fugitive, what if he attacked him?

It was entirely likely, there was no such thing as a civil program in these times, not when they were all so desperate. _It was a foolish, stupid stupid idea. _Zed thought, he grit his teeth.

"So, tell me…" He ventured.

"Guest." Alan offered a random alias.

"Guest. How did you end up caught half derezzed in the rain like that, chased down by Tesler's soldiers? That must be an interesting story."

"It isn't that interesting actually. It's just past curfew, and energy deprived as I was, I couldn't get home quickly enough." It wasn't a lie, not completely. It was past curfew, but that hadn't been why the guard were chasing Alan.

"Rotten luck. Well, I'm glad you found my place in time. I let programs hide out here sometimes, they like to stay out late, going to clubs. I don't think they realize how dangerous that is. Tesler's soldiers target young programs like us for the games, makes for a more entertaining spectacle I gather…" Zed let himself trail off. He sighed. "I'm sorry, I'm babbling-"

Alan cut him off with a comment of his own.

"I haven't been in Argon long." His low, calm voice was unsettling. It was a strange sound, almost too clear, without the synthesized edge of most programs.

Zed nodded. It was a bit obvious the program had just wandered in from elsewhere. He looked out of place, certainly out of touch with the schedule the military had imposed.

"There must be something I can do to replay you." Alan entreated. Zed's eyes widened, taken aback.

"It was no big deal. You don't have to…" He trailed off as a hopeful thought occurred to him. "You don't happen to know any medic programs do you?"

Alan raised an eyebrow under his hood.

"Why? Are you injured?"

"No. My friend…" He tried to explain, but then thought it would be better just to show him. "Follow me."

Zed abruptly stood, wearing a serious, grim expression. Alan followed him through a pair of sliding automatic doors at the back of the room.

This room was dark, as they entered the circuits running through the walls flickered to life. The space was entirely bare except for a mattress, pressed up against the far wall. There was someone lying on it, beneath the thin blanket draped over the figure were the rising and falling curves of a female program. Was she sleeping?

Alan stepped closer, then he stumbled back. The woman was missing half her face and her arm on the same side. The wounds glowed a bright, bloody damage red. Alan could see inside a hollow shell made of those silvery blocks.

There was nothing there but a blue something, a flame. Alan was reminded of the egyptians and their belief that every human had a flame in their chest, their soul and life force. When the flame died, the person died. This flame wavered, like a stubborn birthday candle blown out, and then relighting itself. As the flame flickered, so did her circuits.

The sight was oddly disturbing, Alan felt dizzy with nausea.

"Her name's Mara." Zed's voice came from behind him, small and quiet. "It's… all programs with medical programming cater to Clu's armies. They wouldn't treat her, I can't let them find her… I don't know what to do." Zed admitted, shaking his head, miserable. He'd never felt so helpless, so useless in his life.

"Let me have a look." Alan held his hand out expectantly. The program glanced nervously at Alan's open hand.

"Guest I… you understand I don't want to give her disk to a stranger, you could do anything to her-"

"What about a friend? You saved my life, please let me return the favor. You would have given her disk to an unknown medic."

Zed hesitated, he bit his lip.

"Do you want her to derez without any chance, will you give up that easily?"

Zed flinched. Alan hadn't meant to shout, but he was tired and he hadn't had the greatest day either. He was impatient and he just wanted someone to listen for once, for two seconds before more people started dying.

He thought, in the short time he'd spent on this strange world, he'd had enough death to count him set for the rest of his lives. This one and whatever came next, then after that.

Zed shook his head, as if to clear it. She would derez anyway if he didn't try something, did it matter? They didn't have anything to lose. He crouched, and unclipped the disk from Mara's back.

"Be careful with it." He cautioned, anxiety lining his face. Zed set the disk into the User's waiting hand with a carefulness like he was handling a priceless, porcelain artifact.

Alan sat down on the floor in front of the mattress, disk in his lap. He activated the holographic interface. Zed dropped down next to him, watching closely for any sign that this 'Guest' would betray him.

Alan got to work in a blur of fingers, darting and looping through the air across Mara's code. Zed tried but he couldn't follow their movements, never mind decipher their meaning. It might have been over ten years, but Alan still knew Kevin's erratic and spontaneous coding.

Flynn payed plenty of attention to the big picture, his creations were versatile and flashy, but he didn't code very carefully. He was prone to making errors, some small and some catastrophic, that he wouldn't correct until long after he launched programs. Alan called it being lazy, Flynn called it art.

Alan had caught him making ridiculous mistakes, he once gave a program a contradicting function, it was essentially a paradox. He had to explain to Flynn that machines didn't like paradoxes and impossible directives, like the man was a child. Well, the lecture hadn't happened yet, but it was coming. As soon as Alan found his friend.

His meticulous eye repaired Flynn's original errors after he handled the damage. She would run much better than she had even before the injuries. Zed didn't have long to wait, soon Alan was closing out of the display.

The disk clicked back in place.

Mara's eyes, open wide and staring at nothing, flashed once with a white light.

Just as Zed began to think, _so that's it, it didn't work. _His mouth dropped open, Mara's shell began to reshape itself. Pixels materialized along the jagged, broken edge where her arm had been torn away until an arm lay against her side.

Mara's face was restored to its previous, flawless beauty. She was perfect.

"Mara should reboot in a few min- a few micros, she'll be fine." Alan assured him.

"Thank you." Zed said, breathless. "Thank you. How did you-"

"What happened?" Alan asked with genuine concern. If it was suspicious how quickly he changed the subject, Zed didn't say anything.

"Crazy glitch attacked a guard." He looked away, eyes distant as if he was seeing a different place and time. "She seemed to think that Tron guy was worth getting herself killed for."

"I was on my way here when I saw a wanted poster, lighting up the side of one of the largest buildings in the city. No one else gave it a second glance but… is Tron really in Argon?" Alan couldn't help the hope that made its way into his voice.

The program frowned. He shrugged.

"Either it's Tron, or someone pretending to be him. Last I heard the state had captured this renegade. Some high ranking program was gloating about it over the screens, the ones they set up all around the center of city after Tesler took over, they stream propaganda." Zed explained.

"After that announcement Mara attacked one of the guard. Did she think she could actually make a difference? Stupid. She's programmed to be a mechanic, she can't fight." The way he spoke made Alan wonder if Zed believed his own words.

"Do you know where the renegade's being held?" He asked.

"Everyone knows. There's a giant ship parked right in the middle of the city. No way you can miss that." Zed said, gesturing toward a window with his chin, as if the ship were right outside.

"There's certainly a lot of exiting things going on for such a small city, sitting at the very edge of civilization." Alan observed.

"You're telling me. In this place more crazy things happen than anywhere else on The Grid, I swear."

"I should be going now." Alan moved his hand to his knees, preparing to stand.

Zed looked at him with a mixture of horror and alarm.

"Right now? Aren't you tired? You only had energy, you have to recharge too-"

"I'll be fine. They're still looking for me, I have to keep moving. I have to find my program."


	2. Chapter 2

**Switching my content around. Sorry :  
**

Naturally, the battleship was heavily guarded. It was no secret Alan wasn't a fighter. He thought he might have punched kevin once, but that didn't count, everyone wanted to punch Kevin. He had picked up a few tricks, or cheats he supposed, while on The Grid however.

Alan was angry and impatient, so long spent running and hiding had made him stir crazy. He walked up the ramp to the ship, and right past the guards at the front door. He sent an energy pulse through the ground from the souls of his feet, and the sentries' derezzed instantly. Pieces of broken program crunched under his boots as he crossed over the threshold.

It was like walking into a nest of angry wasps.

A disk flew at his head, Alan knocked it away with his own. Sentries charged at him from all sides, Lightstaffs pointed at Alan like a pack of ancient savages bearing spears. The user dropped down onto his hands and knees.

Energy flowed out from his palms as if he had slapped his hand against the surface of a calm lake, sending a wave rippling through the water. Every sentry froze in place, mid step, like time had stopped. As Alan stood and walked out of the circle of statues, the end of his cloak brushed a sentry's leg.

The program fell into a million pieces, clattering against the floor with a sound like wind chimes. A stray pixel bounced off the sentry nearest, and causing the shell of that sentry to cave in. They collapsed like dominos, one after the other, leaving nothing but a ring of shimmering dead code.

The halls of this place zigzagged and wound like the pathways in a labyrinth, and they were full of enemies. Alan pressed his hand against the wall, as soon as he felt his energy connect with the structures code he gave it a vicious tug.

The wall toppled over, crushing the programs running toward him, weapons drawn to strike him down. He disappeared through the gaping hole created by the destruction of the wall, leaping over rubble.

More walls fell, floors caved in, ceilings collapsed. Furniture was sent catapulting through the air by an invisible force, heavy projectiles smashing through his enemies. He was frightened when a program exploded as he pressed his fingers to its forehead, like there had been gunpowder in its chest.

Hot flying remnants seared his skin. A high pitched embarrassing sound escaped his mouth. He had intended to derez the program peacefully, quietly. He felt the energy building up in his circuits, it was becoming difficult to control.

Alan didn't know where he was going, this place seemed even bigger on the inside that it was on the outside, and from the outside it appeared at least the length of several football fields. He had been wandering aimlessly for the past two hours, he decided that he should probably ask for directions. He figured he could threaten a program for information.

The black guard he had opened his mouth to question immediately attacked him, disk raised for a killing blow to Alan's neck. Alan ducked, and the disk went over his head.

Alan reached for the weapon at his back, but he tripped over his own feet. Instinctively, he reached out to grab the programs arm rather than fall and be laid out dazed and vulnerable on the floor. His other hand, flailing, connected with the back of a chair; he used it to steady himself.

The program yelped at his touch, he jerked away as if Alan had burned him. Indeed the fabric over the program's forearm had burned away in the shape of Alan's hand print, the program's skin was an angry red beneath. _Has the light from my circuits always been this blinding_? Alan wondered.

He stumbled when suddenly his supporting chair vanished out from under his fingers. He leapt back, the chair actually began to _melt_ under his hand. The red frame lost its shape, turning into a viscous bubbling black liquid like boiling molasses. The substance spilled onto the floor, the chair became a puddle.

"You won't last _User_." The program sneered. "You don't know how to fight. You've draining your own life force alternatively. Soon, it will kill you." He warned, before he crumbled into silver shards.

So much for directions.

Alan shook his head, trying to rid himself of all the strangeness, all the surreality. Trying to forget the cold dark thing that had knotted it's way around his heart, that crushed it tighter in it's constricting, suffocating grip ever time he destroyed another program. He tried to unthink the thought _I never killed anyone until today_.

Alan grit his teeth. He couldn't question his actions. It didn't matter right now. He needed to get to Tron before Clu. That was all he could afford to think about. Nothing else mattered. There wasn't a cost he was unwilling to pay.

* * *

He should have listened to Beck. He didn't know where his friend was now, if he escaped or if he was captured, if he was derezzed. Dyson was dead, but when Clu finally decided to show his face, Tron would wish he was the one lying in pieces across the floor.

A guard who seemed to think he was in charge of the battleship now that Tron had taken all his pent up rage out on Dyson, stood over him. Tron was on his knees, head bowed. He was beaten too badly to move from this position, his limbs wouldn't respond with more than searing pain. This guard was one who worked directly under Clu, Tron didn't know his name.

He had reached Dyson easily enough. He had been surprised when there hadn't been guards stationed outside their leaders room, he walked in unchallenged. Tron had easily knocked the disk out of Dyson's hand, risen in defense.

The terrified program ran for the door only to discover it had been sealed shut. Tron might have thought that was suspicious too, if he hadn't been enjoying the program's screams so very much as his disk tore through Dyson's chest, through his arms and his face and his neck.

Now Tron had a good idea as to who had ordered the sentries out of the halls and who had locked that door. The locking door was the hatch of a trap closing behind him, sentries had rezed into the room after Dyson was dust and Tron was left panting, drained from a potent mixture of emotion and exertion.

The guard was grinning, entirely pleased with himself, Dyson had been the poisoned bait. Now he would have the honor of handing Tron over to Clu, and he was expecting the promotion that would guarantee him luxury and comfort for the rest of his long program life.

His hands were clasped together, a final act of defiance.

"You can pray to your precious Users all you want. They will never hear you. They will never come for you. Why can't you understand? They've abandoned all of us."

"You're the one who doesn't understand."

"Oh, I'll show you how much I understand." The guard crushed his boot down on Tron's shoulder, on the gash tearing it in two. He bit back a scream. "Clu wants to repurpose you, he'll repair you then, but we have some time to kill before he arrives. I'll tear you apart, pixel by pixel. Let's find out how broken you can become without derezzing."

"You wouldn't dare." The sharp deadly voice confused the guard, because it came from behind him, and Tron was in front of him.

It was a stupid thing to say, an anti-climatic line, the program couldn't dare. The program was puddle of scattered pixels at his feet. Alan's disk whirred in his hand, hot like a computer left running. The program's liquid code dripped from the white edge.

It mixed with Alan's own code of sorts where it streamed from the torn flesh beneath his sleeve, traveling in small rivers down his wrist and over fingers, across the surface of the disk.

Tron looked up into the face of his savior. It was his own face, angry, contorted into a snarl. Grey eyes glowed like hot coals with hatred. The face was smeared in a dark red fluid. It was blood, a User's blood, this User's blood.

The red fell from his white robes. In the silence created by the absence of the guard's ranting, the steady _drip drip drip_, of blood against the floor sounded like rolling thunder. The User's legs gave out from under him, his knees hit the floor hard, but he didn't give any indication that he was in pain. Instead he reached out, and pulled Tron into an embrace. Alan breathed an unsteady, shaky sigh of relief.

"You're safe." He said breathlessly, but it was more to assure himself than Tron. Tron distantly felt a heavy hand land on his disk, and unclipped it from the dock at his back.

Through half lidded eyes all he could see was his User's shoulder, all he could feel was warmth. The pain of his wounds was a far away numb thing. Pain was tiny in comparison to this feeling of security and just being _home_, like he had been so hopelessly lost all his life. Exhaustion dragged him into shutdown.

When Tron came back online he was disoriented. He couldn't remember where he was or how he'd gotten here. He was thinking thoughts like, _Flynn hasn't returned to The Grid yet_. And_ I better go stop Clu from brooding in his office, we'll spar to keep his mind of Flynn's absence. He'll waste into nothing shut away in that place. _

Some of his functions had been reset to a previous time so many cycles ago, the readings he pulled up told him, in order to repair some sort of extensive damage. Old memories grappled with the more recent, confusing him, data warred within his head. Tron's eyes blinked open when he decided that he would find out where and when he was for himself.

His scars were gone. There was no sign of the damage Clu had inflicted on him. He felt brand new, like he had just been compiled. He felt like he could defeat the MCP and Clu if they had teamed up. He could take on every program across The Grid. Tron sat up.

A User lay on the ground next to him, on his side in a pool of his own blood. Alan's graying hair had been stained red. His eyes were closed, as if he were in recharge, Tron recognized the User state of shutdown called unconsciousness. His face paled and any confidence he had drained out of him.

"A-Alan One?" He shook the User's shoulder in a feeble attempt to revive him, the tremors shooting down his arm made even that difficult. "Alan One, please wake up." His voice sounded quiet and far away even to his own ears, like he was speaking into one end of a tunnel while his ears were at the other.

His vision faded into blackness and he had to catch himself on his hands as he lost the ability to keep himself upright. Tron shook his head, blinking the dark from his eyes. There was a whirring blasting in his ears, the sound of an internal cooling fan struggling to keep him from overheating. His chest heaved, breathing deep erratic breaths as he tried to cool himself down and stave off the panic.

Clenching his teeth so tightly together he thought they might shatter, he gathered the User in his arms. Blood smeared his grid suit and soaked his gloves. He would carry him out if he had to.

Tron had thought he would have to fight his way free of the ship. There was no one to fight, outside Dyson's private room there was only devastation. Derezzed programs crunched under his feet. It looked like someone had taken an energy cannon to every other surface.

In many places code hadn't been broken, but melted away. Pieces of the ship, walls and furniture, were reduced to thick black goo. Blue flames licked at the wall and reached for the ceiling, the ship was burning. Had his User caused all this destruction? Just to reach him?

Tron dashed under walls as they were collapsing, running for his life, to escape the battleship falling down on top of them. The infrastructure creaked and groaned in warning.

As soon as Tron burst through the exit, arch was crumbled behind him, sealing the ship forever. The guards here were derezzed too. Tron descended the wide ramp of stairs leading to the empty city street. The other programs were too frightened to get close to the ship. Tron hadn't come across any sign of Beck, until he looked up. Relief almost took his legs out from under him.

A familiar silhouette was sitting on a roof. His back faced Tron, his head hung between his shoulders. Tron crossed the street to the building.

"Beck, help me." He called up to him.

"You want my help _now_? Maybe you shouldn't have refused my help before." Beck's shoulder's shifted with a movement that told Tron he was stubbornly crossing his arms in front of his chest. "What makes you think I would help you?" He growled.

"Please Beck, my User, I think he's dying."


	3. Chapter 3

**Here's that third thing.**

"A User? You're not serious. That's impossible." Beck's head was turned by an interest he couldn't control.

The dark figure slid off the edge of the roof, he landed in a crouch on the ground, in the black shadow of the building. Beck stepped forward into the light, and Tron could see the curiosity lighting up his face like a newly rezed program seeing The Grid for the first time.

"What _is_ that stuff?" He asked, lip curling up in disgust.

"Its blood, it means he's hurt. Do you have a vehicle?"

"There's a hanger that way." Beck told him, pointing down the street to his right. "It has some gunships that can seat three programs. We'll steal one."

* * *

"I call the guns!" Beck shouted.

Without waiting for a reply he clamored up the side of the ship and into the gunner's seat. The pair of sentries guarding the ship lay sprawled on the floor, out cold.

Tron set Alan down in the passenger's seat. He went around the jet and jumped up into the pilot's chair. Beck considered the User, head lolling to the side at an awkward angle.

"He looks just like you man, it's kind of creepy."

"Let's just get him home before he dies, alright?"

"Ok. Ok. No need to snap at me."

As Tron started up the ship, its circuits flashed from crimson to blue.

They took off. The ship flew low over the other military vehicles in the hanger, before clearing the wide wall to wall door, and rocketing up toward the clear sky. Argon stretched out below them, a billion shining lights.

Beck's hesitant voice broke the silence.

"I uh…"

"What is it Beck?" Tron's harsh tone didn't seem to affect the other program.

"I'm glad you're still _not dead_. Or you know, enslaved."

"Thanks." He deadpanned.

"No really. Even though you're still a complete as-jerk."

Tron flinched. He opened his mouth to say something, but Beck beat him to it.

"I forgive you by the way." Beck's head was turned away, he rested his chin against the heel of his hand and was looking out at the view.

"How did you- I didn't even apolo-"

"I knew you were going to say it." He informed him, a smug smile on his face.

"I wasn't- I mean I was-"

"I just knew alright? I'm nice aren't I? I'm awesome that way. You have to say that, if you really do want the full forgiveness package. Admit that Beck – no, his most awesomeness- is the greatest program on The Grid. Also, he's better than Tron in every way. He's stronger than Tron, more good looking than Tron, he definitely gets more girls that Tron. Thrice-ly, Tron is an idiot. Fourthly, Beck was right. Of course, because Beck is always right-"

Tron closed his eyes, he took a deep breath, resisting the urge to throw Beck off the jet so all that would be coming out of his mouth were his screams as he plummeted five hundred feet.

"I'm not saying that." He said, managing to keep his voice even.

"Don't worry. I'll get him to say it." Beck stage whispered to the unconscious User in the passenger seat, still grinning.

* * *

Tron gazed out the window overlooking the beautiful view of the outlands, the rising and falling stone formations were the only form of nature this world had to offer. His hands were folded behind his back, and he wore his usual severe expression. His User slept, soundly behind him.

Everything was peaceful and quiet. Beck had retreated to another room, and had fallen into recharge. The rhythmic sound of his User's breathing, as his chest rose and fell, put him at some sort of ease. But just because he had managed not to kill his own User didn't make what he'd done any less unforgivable.

He had made another terrible irreversible mistake, only this time his User had taken the fall for it. Not Flynn, not himself, not the system. Alan One had shoulder the burden of cleaning up his mess. It was the ultimate failure of his programming.

He wasn't worthy of anything Alan One had given him, not his life, not his purpose. He already failed to protect everything else, now he had failed to protect the person who had given him a reason in the first place. He wondered if he was capable of making any of the right choices at all, certainly he couldn't raise an uprising now.

He couldn't be trusted with the responsibility of lives, as he led programs quite possibly to their deaths, not when he acted so recklessly, so foolishly.

Tron withdrew from the window. He moved toward the center of the room where a white slab, like a table without legs, hovered. Alan was lying on his back, Tron couldn't read the expression he was wearing in his sleep.

Beck and Tron had done their best to stabilize his condition, but there were terrifying hours when Tron believed his User was beyond saving. Eventually they exhausted any medical knowledge they might have shared between them, all that could be done was wait.

Beck tried to get him to sit, Tron just paced and paced and paced in this spot in front of Alan's sickbed, for the entire millicycle. Beck had though he was going to wear a circle into the floor deep enough for them to make a basement. Slowly but surely Alan's wounds had healed on their own, in that miraculous way User's had of healing themselves.

His fingers ghosted over the white edge of the table. Tron bowed his head.

"I'm sorry." The words tumbled out from his mouth in a strange voice he didn't recognize.

He was startled when a hand grabbed his.

A pair of cold, angry blue eyes stared up at him. Tron froze. His blood, if he'd had blood, would have turned to ice. He wondered with detached curiosity, if Alan One was going to derez him. He would accept his User's judgment, it was nothing less than he deserved.

"You have nothing to apologize to me for-" Alan stopped scolding his program when he saw Tron's face, all hard lines as if it were carved out of stone, and certainly pale as white marble. Alan's expression morphed into an innocent kind of worry. He gave Tron's hand a reassuring squeeze. "Are you alright? You look like you're staring death in the face, maybe having a staring contest. I think you're winning to."

Tron shook his head, no. He wasn't alright.

"I'm the one who should be sorry. I should have known about all this." Alan gestured around at the room with his free hand, meaning The Grid, meaning programs actually being living, feeling people, meaning everything. "I should have been there to stop Clu at the beginning…" Alan's words trailed off into a sigh. A kind, optimistic smile lit up his face, banishing any despondence. His User's eyes glanced around the room. "It's over. We're both alive?" Alan asked, unsure himself. It was difficult to be sure of anything the way the day had gone.

Tron nodded.

"What is there to be sad about then? That's the best news I've heard all day. You made a mistake, so what? You can learn from it, it will make you a better person. That's why mistakes were invented in the first place. If we didn't have them we would all be really terrible, ignorant people." Alan said. "Don't repeat it." He told him, with all seriousness. Hissing in pain, he struggled up onto his elbows. "Help me up will you? We have a rebellion to start, and an empire to conquer."

Tron's eyes widened in alarm, immediately his hands were on Alan's shoulders, pushing him back down. Was he trying to hurt himself again?

He obviously didn't understand how things worked in his house.

Tron's voice ripped from his throat with a growl.

"Not so fast. You need to rest first, then you need battle training, extensive laborious painful battle training. That has to be the stupidest thing anyone's ever done. You can't burn your soul like gasoline. It _won't_ be happening in the future." He ordered.

Alan laughed.

"Alright, alright. You're the boss."

Alan wore a victorious grin at the upward tug at the corner of his program's lips that might have been a smile.


End file.
